1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a provisional settling system, an encryption interchange system, a delivery system, and a digital contents sales system in which payment for goods or services is made from a payer (purchaser, service requester, etc.) to a payee (seller, service provider, etc.) as provisional payment according to money information as digital data containing provisional settlement information, and the payer or a checker, who checks an object for which the payment is made, carefully checks the contents of the received goods and services before the final settlement.
2. Description of the Related Art
As for conventional payment means, payment is popularly made in cash, by check, note, transfer between banking accounts, prepaid card, and credit card.
Common payment methods are prepayment methods in which payment is made before receiving goods, immediate payment on receipt of goods, and delayed payment after receipt of goods. However, in any of these payment methods, a purchaser is subject to a risk of receiving goods and a payment risk, whereas a seller is subject to a collection risk of receiving payment.
That is, in the prepayment method, a purchaser is subject to the risk of receiving goods, namely that the purchaser may not receive goods even after the payment is made by any payment means, or the purchaser may not be satisfied with the received goods. There also may arise the payment risk that the already paid money will not be refunded.
In the immediate payment on receipt of goods, a payment means is limited to cash, check, etc. Furthermore, although a purchaser can receive goods in exchange for the payment, the purchaser cannot carefully check the received goods. Therefore, the purchaser is subject to the risk of receiving goods, in that the received goods are not satisfactory. There is also a payment risk as in the prepayment method.
In the delayed payment after receipt of goods, however, a seller is subject to the collection risk, in any of the above described payment means, that the expense cannot be collected even after goods are delivered.
When a purchaser is not satisfied with the contents of the received goods, he or she can return the goods to the seller of the goods. However, the purchaser is also subject to the risk that the paid money is not refunded, and it may take a long time to get it back even if it should be successfully refunded.
Furthermore, another problem may arise with digital contents such as software, image data, etc. transmitted through a communications network. That is, such intangible goods are subject to the risk that a purchaser may refuse the payment by insisting the poor quality of the received goods even after the goods have been successfully delivered to the purchaser.
When the above described digital contents are marketed through a network, there can be various risks such as an illegal use risk by the third party, an illegal substitution risk, a privacy infringement risk relating to interpretation (wiretapping) by the third party, etc.
At present, it is considered that an encryption process method is the most effective method for reducing the above described risks. However, since the present encryption process method requires a public key, a common key, etc. of each other between the source and the destination (receiver) of data, a complicated process should be performed including user authentication. Furthermore, encrypted data cannot be transmitted between the source and the destination unless the encryption interfaces including the application for encryption are optimally set at both sides.
As described above, in the conventional settlement system in any payment method with any payment means, a payee such as a seller of goods, a service provider, etc. is subject to a collection risk, and a payer such as a purchaser, service requester, etc. is subject to a risk of receiving goods or a payment risk. Both payer and payee are subject to a risk of returning goods.
In transactions through a network, both payer and payee are subject to various risks such as an illegal use risk by the third party, an illegal substitution risk, a privacy infringement risk by wiretapping by the third party, etc.